Promoter Eddie Hearn has revealed that boxing has become Anthony Joshua\u2019s refuge as the heavyweight continues to grieve the deaths of two close friends killed in a car crash in Nigeria in December, Saturday PUNCH reports.\n<\/p>\n
Joshua was visiting Nigeria, where his parents were born, when he was involved in the accident. He survived with injuries, but childhood friend Latif Ayodele and recovery therapist Sina Ghami lost their lives. The tragedy cast serious doubt over Joshua\u2019s boxing future and understandably kept him away from training for a period.\n<\/p>\n
He has since returned to camp, and Hearn told SunSport in Egypt that the gym has proven to be the most important factor in Joshua\u2019s recovery.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is his kind of safe place. This is his place where he can concentrate his mind. And obviously, it\u2019s been an extremely difficult period in his life, but AJ\u2019s a very determined individual, and I think a lot of the grief and pain that he carries with him, he\u2019s focusing into his training,\u201d Hearn said.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of what he does is dedicated towards his friends and his brothers in Sina and Latz. And of course, there\u2019ll be pain in his mind and his heart, but he\u2019s focused on what he loves, and he\u2019s focused on what they all used to do together, which was being in training camp and working hard.\u201d <\/p>\n
Joshua is currently in Egypt supporting Oleksandr Usyk, who defends his WBC heavyweight title on Saturday against kickboxer Rico Verhoeven. The 36-year-old has been training alongside the pound-for-pound number one, an arrangement Hearn said has transformed Joshua\u2019s outlook significantly.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve never seen him like this. I just grabbed a word with Usyk there. I just wanted to thank him for allowing AJ into his camp and for all the motivation that he\u2019s given him. Because he\u2019s in a tremendous place \u2014 one of the best training camps in the world with the pound-for-pound number one pushing him every day. He\u2019s enjoying training, he\u2019s improving, he\u2019s fitter than he\u2019s ever been. But more than that, he\u2019s motivated and excited about the future,\u201d Hearn said.<\/p>\n
The turnaround has been so complete that Joshua, who had discussed 2026 potentially being his final year in boxing, is now reportedly talking about continuing for another three years.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cWe said today there was a time we were saying 2026 might be his last year in boxing. Right now, he\u2019s talking about another three years. So yeah, he\u2019s enjoying himself. You\u2019ve got to understand this guy wants it more than ever, he\u2019s training harder than ever. He\u2019s going outside of his comfort zone to find the best environment for him. And he\u2019s found that in this training camp,\u201d Hearn said.\n<\/p>\n
Joshua returns to the ring on July 25 in Riyadh against Albanian heavyweight Kristian Prenga, his first bout since the accident. Contracts are already signed for a long-awaited showdown with Tyson Fury, which is being targeted for November.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Promoter Eddie Hearn has revealed that boxing has become Anthony Joshua\u2019s refuge as the heavyweight continues to grieve…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":688655,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[8075,64,63,802,9915,8812,240211,24605,7704,16748,85,30139,8691],"class_list":["post-688654","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-anthony-joshua","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-boxing","tag-eddie-hearn","tag-heavyweight","tag-kristian-prenga","tag-nigeria","tag-oleksandr-usyk","tag-riyadh","tag-sports","tag-tragedy","tag-tyson-fury"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688654","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=688654"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688654\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/688655"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=688654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=688654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=688654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}